A slash and burn assault on government, even when its race tinged, doesn't hurt Ron Paul one bit. It gets media and public attention, draws denunciations from his defenders as hitting below the belt, and quiet cheers from the multitudes that happen to agree with him.

The Iowa Caucuses are mere days away, and that means two things. First, it means we all get to say, "the Iowa Caucuses are mere days away." And second, it means that we get to stage the perennial argument over whether Iowa is representative enough of the country at large for it to have such an outsized role in determining the eventual winner of the presidential primary season. Ultimately, there are a lot of reasons we have this argument, but there are also a lot of reasons for why the argument doesn't go anywhere.

The most striking aspect of this primary season has not been the search by many conservative voters for an alternative to Mitt Romney. Rather, the main story of the Republican primary season has been that the race has been extraordinarily uncompetitive.